


You’ve Known, All This Time

by TheDoctorSong



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst, Darillium, Episode Fix-It: s04e08 Silence in the Library, F/M, Post-Episode: 2015 Xmas The Husbands of River Song
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-01
Updated: 2020-02-16
Packaged: 2021-02-27 18:41:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,431
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22500403
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDoctorSong/pseuds/TheDoctorSong
Summary: After their first night in Darillium River discovers what awaits her in the future.
Relationships: The Doctor/River Song
Kudos: 23





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> My very first fic so any comments would be amazing and incredibly helpful for future chapters!

Waking with a yawn River rolled on her side expecting to see eyebrows and a dashing smile. Disappointment flooded her thoughts until she saw a note on his pillow. Of course he would go out to find a local café to bring back a proper breakfast. Sentimental idiot. 

River silently scolds herself for expecting 24 years of bliss with a man who can barely sit still in a chair, let alone a single planet. This is the life she knows, the life she lives, and truly she wouldn’t have it any other way. But their end is drawing near. As she saw her husband get younger and younger she began feeling a bit lost and started to see more of Mels in the mirror. Believing she would be on her own soon she has coped the only way she knows how, strolling through the universe like she owns it and burying any negative thoughts behind a mask. She’s no longer his wife and she shouldn’t expect him to keep true to his word last night. Rule one. The Doctor lies. 

River pulled herself out of bed and found her robe slung over her desk chair. The TARDIS was humming per usual, singing to her child. She decided to head to the kitchen and put on the kettle, god knows what her husband has gotten into and how long he would be. As she started down the usual corridors to the kitchen she ended up in the console room instead. 

“Now why did you take me here?” River pondered aloud as she made her way to the console. The TARDIS hummed a bit louder in response as a flash of light brought her attention to the screen above the console. She slowly descended the stairs and made her way to the scanner, prepared to see her husband running from native life in need of help as he’s prone to doing. Instead there was a news excerpt. River read one paragraph before she stopped herself. 

“Spoilers! You ought to know better.”

The TARDIS responded in quite the scolding tone. River knew the TARDIS must have her reasons for showing her the day she has come to dread. She knew that it would be his tenth self, the one that currently looked at her from the screen. She knew those young, yet ancient, eyes would show no recognition. What she didn’t know was that she would die. That is, until the TARDIS showed her a news story about the Library. River heard whispers at the university of a possible exhibition and was instantly intrigued. But staring at the monitor she now knew she would go, she would meet a husband who didn’t know her, and she would sacrifice herself. She always thought she’d die to save him, and now she will have. 

“Why show me this?” 

The TARDIS replied with a soothing tone that also notated she was waiting. All the possibilities raced through River’s head before she came to a conclusion. She must die because she already had. It’s part of why the Doctor fell in love with her. Putting all the pieces together of meeting a younger Doctor made it all so obvious that she would die for him when he met her. What she couldn’t put together was why the TARDIS was telling her. The library would be her next and last destination and she couldn’t stop it, she didn’t want to. She would never change her past. Not one line. 

The doors to the TARDIS swung open as the Doctor stumbled in carrying far too many takeout boxes. Thankfully this new body of his isn’t quite as clumsy as his last. Once he saw River in the room he couldn’t help his ridiculous smile, she was even more brilliant than when he’d left her he mused. But after seeing wet eyes he halted. 

“River, what’s wrong?” The Doctor dropped the takeaway on the floor, walking around the boxes and cautiously made his way to her side. He noticed the scanner on and turned rigid. “Oh River. You weren’t meant to see that. I’m sorry. I tried everything but I couldn’t stop it. I can’t change it, I won’t if it means losing all my time with you.”

River looked into his eyes in awe of this Scotsman who was far easier to read than his baby face. Any doubt she had earlier of him swanning off in the night evaporated as a tear slid down her cheek. “Sweetie. This means you’ve known. All this time. No wonder you were running away at first.” Her sentence ends on an all too forced laugh. 

The Doctor’s hand came up to rest on the side of River’s face as he wiped away the single tear that had betrayed her. “Bloody idiot, I was.” He pulled her into a big hug. ”Bow tie should’ve been running towards you from the start.”

“It’s okay my love. I understand now.”

“No.”

River pulled back from the hug to look into his eyes and see his stubbornness written across his face. “What?”

“No.”

The Doctor stood his ground, hands at his sides. River saw determination and love in his eyes and she wondered how she could have missed seeing that love so plainly when she met this face. “No?”

“No. I won’t let it happen again.”

River sighed in resignation. “Doctor, it already has happened. And I wouldn’t change a bit of it. We still have 24 years to go.”

“You did this, didn’t you!” The Doctor yelled at the ceiling, arms flapping as he walked away. “You just had to go on and show her that last bloody spoiler. Why?” He stood still as his last word came out full of grief. A single tear fell. He turned to look at his wife, standing there smiling at him. River always hid the damage. This was no different. 

“Sweetie, the old girl must have had a reason. But for now we have time. That is, if you’d like to spend an entire Darillium night here.” 

River’s smile still in place, she stood and waited. He looked a mess, a tear streak on his check and his eyebrows to the ceiling. He nearly jumped towards her but stopped just short and rested a hand on her shoulder. “Of course I’m staying the night with you. Don’t you dare think I wouldn’t. Besides, seeing as it’s our last…”

The Doctor couldn’t finish the sentence. He never did like endings. River took a moment to collect her thoughts as she stared into his ancient eyes. As old as he is, as much as he has grieved, his eyes still conveyed a tiny spark of hope that she couldn’t help but cling to. 

“The TARDIS showed me this for a reason. We’ll figure this out. But first, tea.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tea time

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments are very welcome, especially as this is my first fic 
> 
> Thanks for reading!

After eating half their breakfast in silence and the other half ignoring the issue at hand, River cleaned up the plates and refilled their tea before sitting once more. She and The Doctor looked at one another from across the table and knew they could no longer avoid the Dalek in the room. Neither of them knew where to begin but River knew they needed to figure out why the TARDIS would tell her about her impending death when it’s now a fixed point. If she were to change anything then their entire relationship would be rewritten. She may not even exist if things change too much. The TARDIS has to know this, so why make her suffer at the beginning of her final honeymoon?

“Well you’re younger self’s actions make more sense now, at least” she said with a smirk on her lips at her memories of teasing a very young Doctor until his face turned beet red. 

“Don’t make excuses, I was terrible. Miracle you never left me.”

“More like learned patience. Never a skill I thought I’d pick up but my dad showed me how important it can truly be.” The Doctor visibly saddened at the mention of the Roman. Over a millennia for him and he still mourns their loss. Of course Manhattan was much more recent for River and she’s only just become able to talk about them at all.

“Great man, your dad. Best man I ever met.” The Doctor looks into River’s eyes as she holds back tears. “I’m sorry River.” He looks down and stares at the tea in his hands. 

“For what?”

“For what?” Oh how his eyebrows have furrowed. “River they were your parents and I was utter shite. I was too overcome with my own grief that I wasn’t there when you needed me most.”

“Oh but you always have been. You always come when I call. And I know how much Amy meant to you. They were more than companions, Sweetie, they were family. We were an actual family.” River reached across the table to take one of his hands between hers.

“Still are.” The Doctor’s searching eyes must have seen the slight surprise in River’s. He reached across the table with his unoccupied hand and held their entwined hands with care, slowly rubbing his thumb over the back of hers. Her gaze lingering over their connected hands as he continued. “River, now that you know about The Library, I don’t think I can let you go through with it. I’m a selfish old man, too cowardly to ever say goodbye.”

River looks up and studies his ancient eyes once more. “The TARDIS knows that, yet she showed me anyway. There must be a way out, always is.”

“Not this time.” He repeats just words from last night, earth time of course. She tried convincing him then but he seemed so sure it almost broke her hearts. 

“There’s always a way out” she reminds him with a slight smile. 

“I already took the way out. River, I’m sorry.” He paused to take in a deep breath and stared into her eyes, willing her to understand. Forget bloody spoilers.” The Doctor had a pained expression as he carried on to reveal his first spoiler. “The Library at its core is an incredibly powerful database built to entertain a dying girl forever, surrounding her with all the books in the universe. You sacrificed yourself, connected to the database to save thousands of lives. I saved your ghost to the data core but I couldn’t save you. I knew, even then, how much I cared for you, how much you would come to mean to me. My amazing River. And I trapped you in yet another prison because I didn’t know. How could I have?” He brought his hands up and kissed each one with admiration in his eyes. “I’m sorry.”

“You’re forgiven. Always and completely.” She tried conveying the truth of that with her eyes. 

“Not for this, I don’t deserve it.”

“Yes for this, for everything. Doctor, you forgave me when I killed you, I can forgive you this.”

“I trapped you in yet another prison. It’s my fault you’ve always been trapped in some sort of prison.”

“As I’ll remind you I’ve earned my pardon, ages ago. And there’s no way you could have known I’d spent most of my life in prison. You just met me. And if I never told you then, or will have, I’m saying it now. You are forgiven.”

“I don’t deserve you.”

“I know.” River’s lips curl into a smile. “Maybe you can show me that you do.”

“Maybe I will.” His new rough Scottish voice does things to her and she’s ever so excited to see just how Scottish this new mouth can get. “Later.” With a promise for what later will bring, The Doctor felt more capable of discussing what he has held in for so long. 

“Why make a girl wait?” River says with a smirk on her face and her eyes full of mischief. 

“River. I told you I saved you but that’s only part of it.” This brought River’s attention back to the discussion at hand. “You were connected to the planet’s core. An echo, a ghost. There was nothing left of your body.” His focus returned once more to their hands. 

“Sweetie, did you see my body disappear?” River could list the number of things that would disintegrate a body but connecting to a database was not on it. 

“No, actually, I was handcuffed and there was a very bright light, and when I looked back you were gone.” 

“Bright light? Wait, handcuffed? Just how much had you come to admire me your first day?” 

“River, what? No. Not like that!” That rough Scottish voice was already one of her favorite things of this new body. Teasing him into making his voice raise an octave suddenly became one of her new favorite things. 

“You were the one you said you were handcuffed Sweetie.”

“Only because you knocked me out and handcuffed me out of reach of my sonic.”

“Ooh I am looking forward to this. Younger you is such fun.” 

River was surprised by the smirk that appeared on The Doctor’s face. That is, until he said “not nearly as much fun as I am.” This was another thing that River loved about this body. He is now much more difficult to fluster. She would soon find his limit of innuendos. 

“Darling, what did this ‘bright light’ look like?”

The Doctor seemed to contemplate this. It was a rather long time ago for him yet it was still a day he would never forget. “Almost like a white dwarf star.”

“How long did you look away from it?”

“Let’s see, approximately 6.3 seconds, mind you that was over a millennia ago.”

“And a vortex manipulator takes how long to work?”

“1.8 seconds.” At this the Doctor ran through that dreadful day once more. “No. Couldn’t be. You were linked to the data core. Even I wouldn’t have been able to survive that.”

“Who said my body survived?”

The Doctor’s face reminded her of how his former self reacted to seeing a brand new hat. “River Song, you amazing, incredible, bloody brilliant woman!”

The Doctor jumped up and ran around the table to pull River into a standing position before he picked her up and spun them in a circle. His giddiness brought out River’s laugh in full force until he finally set her down and snogged the smirk off her face. She melted into him. “Is this later?”

“You bet it is “ he growled out before he lifted her once more to carry her to their room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You can blame the Shatter Me series for the late update.


End file.
